Are you running stock, or NextUI? I’ve certainly not had that kind of battery loss!

A dedicated Game Boy Advance console, literally designed to be a love letter with thumbsticks just doesn’t feel right to me! Luckily for you though, they make GBA-esque one with the sticks: the RG34XX SP

Here’s my own review of the Rotate, just for some context:

https://gardinerbryant.com/hands-on-with-the-anbernic-rg-rotate/

But yes, the RG Rotate is far more powerful. It’ll run your PSX games upscaled. This one has 3GB RAM, which is a far cry from the RGSP’s 1GB, so you’ll have the benefits of:

• Upscaling the PlayStation (or N64, or DC) games without an issue
• Having enough overhead to run whatever shaders you like. I only tried a few, because shaders are just not my thing. But they’ll absolutely be happier on the Rotate
• Enough power in the to run some fun Android games. I know, you’re looking for specifically retro, but it is nice to have options.
• It is also beautifully unique. I love the rotating screen. I just had another delivered actually. Anbernic sent me the metal one to review back on release, but I just got the plastic version for a follow-up article I’m working on right now! My most recommended apps, programs and some physical accessories.

If GBA is your dream, you just can’t beat the RGSP. If you want DC/N64/PSX without compromises? Then the Rotate is your answer. I do just love them both though, just for different reasons.

Have you tried Aliexpress?

From what I’ve seen, that is the option which saves the most on shipping. Anbernic’s own site adds way too much with shipping, but when they sell on Aliexpress that drops so significantly. I’ve seen a few users saying it is the way to go, so maybe it is worth a look!

Have you tried Aliexpress?

From what I’ve seen, that is the option which saves the most on shipping. Anbernic’s own site adds way too much with shipping, but when they sell on Aliexpress that drops so significantly. I’ve seen a few users saying it is the way to go, so maybe it is worth a look!

(And I totally understand, with those handhelds the power to run GBA games is well in hand, but the form factor of this RGSP is a beautiful nod to the original!)

If you’ve got some nostalgia for playing the Game Boy Advance back when it was the thing, then this might scratch that nostalgia itch you didn’t know you had :)

The R36S is a pretty unique device. It is very low powered, by the retro handheld industry standards. It is very cheap (by anyone’s standards), and it is not built, maintained nor shipped by any one single company. The strengths of it is that it is so widely available, and one of the smartest developers I know (bmdhacks, who recently joined in as the lead dev for ARMSX2) swears by them. In fact I covered his work for the R36S specifically, not so long ago:

https://gardinerbryant.com/the-anatomy-of-an-impossible-port/

But it really is as entry-level-to-the-hobby as you can get. There are infinitely more powerful devices all over the place. This one, the RGSP is just…different. It is specifically designed to be about as good as you can hope for to play GBA games, but also covers most systems up to PSX.

Comparing the two is waaaaay too apples to oranges to make much sense here. While they technically do the same thing, they do it so differently that owning one over the other (or both) makes as much sense whichever way you cut it :)

I’ve had so many SP’s, but I think while I adore the form factor so much, the modern conveniences of things like save states, fast-forwarding, the display and all the other bits make this the logical choice…for me.

Physical it feels exactly the same in my hands, a perfect little boxy box :)

But seems like the tape mod is supposed to work pretty well?

I wouldn’t even call these the most clicky-clicky. They are a bit, but they’re really fine. Two layers will dampen that totally though, and you’ll have zero issues at all. I really can’t recommend this one enough, if you’re after GBA games as good as they can be!

This one solves that! Close the lid and it will suspend right there until you open it :)

And being Linux means that the battery life will be much better with that closed-lid suspension over what Android would manage!!!

Sony used these when they announced, launched and advertised the PSP!

I have a gallery of a ton of these giant PSPs they made in this article I did, if you wanna see more:

https://gardinerbryant.com/my-psp-scrapbook-part-retrospective-part-collage/

If it doesn’t, I highly recommend the OSTENT 1,400 mAh batteries. Higher capacity than the original and they work perfectly. 100% the one to choose!

Oh absolutely. This was exactly me for the longest time. I review retro handhelds, so I’ve had everything from the entry-level to the high power ones (like the Odin 3 Max). I thought you couldn’t get better than upscaled graphics and save states, but when I got a re-obsession semi-recently with the PSP:

https://gardinerbryant.com/tag/psp/

…I’ve realized that native hardware just has magic to it. The handheld is slim, the design is retro futuristic in the best way (in my eyes), the jailbreak and add-ons are invaluable and the experience is just fun. I’ve just reviewed the Retroid Pocket Nova, am reviewing the Anbernic RG SP, and have a couple more on the way, but that isn’t stopping me absolutely loving WipEout on my PSPs :)

So recently, I spent a fair time chatting with the creator of PSPunk, a website I’m sure many here might have visited. But that chatting (which ended up being an interview) pivoted instead to something a bit different from what I usually end up doing with articles.

Rather than just talking about the website itself, we ended up discussing the people who keep older gaming communities alive. We covered how PSPunk started as a simple custom firmware guide, why preserving guides and community knowledge is just as important as preserving games themselves, the modern PSP homebrew scene, and why the handheld still has such an active community more than 20 years after launch. You might recognize me from a few PSP articles I’ve done these last months, I just…think they’re neat:

It was also interesting hearing from someone who doesn’t consider themselves a developer or a major figure in the scene, just “a helpful user who creates guides.” I think that humility says a lot about projects like this, because every community needs people documenting, organizing and preserving information just as much as it needs people writing the software.

That and the ending (V for Vendetta) were the sections I wrote in this article. Because as soon as I saw the news, it was all I could think of :(

“For some people the choice to use a bot or not is a choice of having the job, or not.”

That would be Gardiner’s side of the article. I contributed by wroting two sections on this one:

• The Shadow of Fahrenheit 451, and
• “People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people.”

Just to explain whose take is whose for this little article, at least.

• Shin Megami Tensei 4
• Bravely Default
• Professor Layton (I LOVE PROFESSOR LAYTON!!!)
• Kid Icarus: Uprising
• Metroid: Samus Returns (I’m obsessed with Metroid)

But I’m also playing The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D for the very first time on the AYN Thor at the moment. I’ve never stuck with it, and I’m enjoying it so much. What a game! I’d have expected the ancient age would make it less of a game, but nope. It’s perfect!

There’s so many more, but that’s a nice little cross-section of GREAT games :)